Judith E. Olingy

Education:B.A. 1977, Dickinson CollegeJ.D. 1980, Antioch School of Law

Teaching Areas:Appellate AdvocacyCriminal LawLegal Education

Biography

Judy Olingy joined the Law School's Frank J. Remington Center in 1988. The focus of her work has been clinical legal education and federal criminal postconviction law. She primarily has worked in the Center's Legal Assistance to Institutionalized Persons Project (LAIP) where her students learn the practice and theory of lawyering as they represent their clients at the federal prison at Oxford, Wisconsin.

In their role as lawyers, students concentrate on the fundamentals involved in becoming reflective practitioners who are engaged in a problem-solving profession. In keeping with the law school's tradition of law-in-action, the students learn that the law is but one of the many tools they must use as lawyers in solving their clients' problems. In 2003, Prof. Olingy started the Clinical Semester course at the law school. Second and third year-law students enroll exclusively in the LAIP Oxford project during the fall semester for 13 clinical credits and a two credit seminar. The Clinical Semester affords students an immersion clinical experience in which they can concentrate on learning the practice and theories of lawyering.

Prof. Olingy obtained her undergraduate degree from Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania in 1977, and graduated from Antioch School of Law in Washington, D.C. in 1980. After graduation, she engaged in private law practice, specializing in complex federal litigation and federal labor law. She joined the Enforcement Division of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission as a staff attorney in 1984. Thereafter, she worked as a trial attorney in the Criminal Division at the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington from 1985-1988. She first worked in the Fraud Section, prosecuting white collar fraud cases with multi-state connections; and later transferred to the General Litigation Section, where she counseled numerous federal agencies, engaged in international negotiations concerning jurisdictional questions surrounding international crimes, and continued to investigate and prosecute federal crimes.

Prof. Olingy had the opportunity to teach a course on American criminal sanctions at Justus Liebig Universitat in Giessen, Germany. As a result of that course, law students from Giessen have started participating in LAIP during the fall semester, under Prof. Olingy's supervision, as a means of fulfilling some practice requirements necessary for earning their law degrees. Prof. Olingy is married to Nick Chiarkas, the Wisconsin State Public Defender.